


Dum Spiro Spero

by archaicscript



Category: King Falls AM (Podcast)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-06-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 12:39:38
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,109
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19229332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/archaicscript/pseuds/archaicscript
Summary: Jack returns from the Void but at what cost, will he ever recover mentally from the trauma he sustained?





	Dum Spiro Spero

**Author's Note:**

> A future warning for trauma-related anger and medical phenomena.

The darkness was impenetrable, no light shone through it's inky black intangible walls; he wished it would be accompanied by silence but the ever constant whispering had him at his wits end. 'Help me.' The words left his mouth out of habit, no longer was it a conscious decision made but one purely out of instinct. His footsteps were almost inaudible over the whispering but he focused on that instead, the slap of bare feet over what he could only assume was broken concrete. Suddenly his foot hit air and he was spiraling down into the darkness, unable to determine when the end would finally hit him.

Jack woke with a start, something soft underneath him. Sweat dampened clothes clung to his body as his eyes fluttered open, revealing a white ceiling with a fan that hummed quietly on low. The darkness was gone, replaced with soft sunlight filtering through the curtains of a bedroom that he didn't recognize. Was this another trick? A way to break his resolve and take him over, he'd survived this long by not believing in tricks but he was exhausted. 

The floor under his feet was not the cold concrete from before but soft carpeting that he couldn't help but wiggle his toes over. Everything was warm and bright but quiet, the whispering from before a distant thing of the past. Clothing had been laid out for him, his size and style which perplexed him. A pair of sweats and a sports tee, comfortable as it was convenient for a day at home. Was this... home?

The bathroom mirror provided little comfort, glazed eyes stared back at him as he gazed wearily into it's reflective surface. Dark circles under his eyes, stubble took over his strong jawline but it was light enough that someone would have to look closely to see it. His sunkissed face had paled from years out of the sun, hair darkened without the sun's rays to bleach it. Despite this, his freckles had somehow survived, pale but still danced over his nose and cheeks. 

"Jack?" His voice was easily recognizable after all this time even in it's slightly pitched panicked voice, Sammy stood in the bathroom doorway with a concerned expression that wrinkled his handsome face. Jack's green eyes regarded him silently, afraid to speak out in case this was nothing but a calm before the storm. His life, his love, his heart stood before him and he could do nothing but stare back cautiously. 

A noise hitched in the back of his throat as he finally raised a hand, brushing a thumb over Sammy's cheek to catch a tear that had escaped. "Hey." His voice was rough from disuse and dryness from sleep. "Is it really you?" This felt real enough but everything seemed hazy as if he'd woken from a very bad dream and he could no longer distinguish what was reality.

The arms that encircled him anchored Jack, an embrace so tight that it constricted his lungs to take only shallow breaths. Sammy whispered soft words, sweet honeyed things that made him melt happily in the embrace. It hurt but nothing prepared him for the warmth that blossomed in his chest when his fiance whispered words of love. It felt like it had been years since he heard those words but he couldn't quite remember why. Had they been apart for that long? 

Telling time within the darkness was not a luxury he'd had and when the darkness left him alone, the world around him had been so broken that nothing could help him. A broken world, a mockery of the real one it was constructed to look like. Jack had many theories on what it could have been, all the decrepit broken buildings that he'd traversed while in a never-ending night. His mind had landed on one word that had forever repeated in his head, Purgatory, a place or state of suffering inhabited by the souls of sinners who are expiating their sins before going to heaven. There were too many questions for him to truly answer, was this heaven? 

His digits caught on the elastic band of Sammy's hair-tie and with a tug, long locks were pulled free to tangle around his fiance's shoulders. An action he'd performed many times back in the day, he could see the bittersweet smile that tugged on the blond's features and it brought one to his own. Neither spoke, instead they simply stared at one another without any idea of how to proceed. There were too many things to say and neither wanted to speak first. "Your hair has grown longer." It felt like such a trivial and stupid comment but it got Sammy laughing which served it's purpose. "I like it."

"Let's have some breakfast." There was no move to put his hair back into that ridiculous bun of his, Jack had always liked it down anyway. Everything was unfamiliar here and the pictures were not theirs, this apartment was too small to be their own. It was as if Sammy had read his mind as he speaks, "Ben left early to have breakfast with Emily." 

"Ben?" 

"This is his apartment, I'm livi-... We're living with him temporarily. He was the one who saved you, both of them." Sammy sets a bowl of oatmeal in front of him, his favorite fruits piled on top of the creamy concoction. "The doctor said you may have short term memory loss from trauma." 

"Did the doctor say anything about nightmares?" Jack asks, stirring his oatmeal despite his fiance's dismay. Sammy always said the oatmeal was better if he only ate one piece of fruit at a time but he'd always muddied it by mixing it together. Silence grew between them as he watched the blond's face and his ever changing expressions, something was troubling him and he didn't want to say it.

A long drawn out sigh from Sammy answered his question and he arched a brow in response. "Yes, along with lapses in time and even loss of appetite." It hadn't even occurred to Jack that he hadn't taken a bite from his breakfast and he rectified that seconds later, it was far more delicious that he remembered. Warm oatmeal with a cold burst of juice from the fruit, the bittersweet taste of blueberries on his tongue."

"Where are we, Sammy?" Jack shifts in his seat, leaning heavily on his elbows. The answer was not what he'd expected but it brought back memories that he'd forgotten. King Falls. The words felt like a wound that was suddenly reopened and just like that, he found himself falling into darkness again.

**Author's Note:**

> Translation:  
> Dum spiro spero: While I breathe, I hope.


End file.
